I saw part of this video on Chris Matthews’ show tonight. They’re cute 4th-graders, so I’m not going to be hard on them. They are singing a hopeful tune, Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe.”
I like their message: “Vote FOR somebody.” I always do that, never do I vote against a candidate or for the lesser of two evils. Also, I agree that voting is a civic duty. Everybody who is eligible to vote ought to vote.
But here’s where they get it wrong. “Democracy” does not begin and end with the two-party system we have with Republicans and Democrats. There is more to democracy than that. We have many parties, and when you vote FOR somebody it ought to be somebody who represents your values and beliefs. Neither major party does that for me. On issue after issue, there is no appreciable difference between the big political parties. I cannot make my voice heard by voting for (or against) Romney or Obama. Neither one of them dares to state publicly what their real priorities would be if elected, anyway.
I voted for Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate for President. The day after I put my ballot in the mail, the two-party system had her arrested and thrown in jail.
UPDATE: Strategic voting is how the people can win (now we just need a song!)
[D]ue to our 18th century system of presidential elections, your vote in nearly 40 non-swing states (e.g. West Coast, most of Northeast, deep South) will not be decisive because one side or the other will easily win those states. Progressives can take strategic advantage of this archaic voting system that’s winner-take-all in each state.
So please sign this pledge to promote strategic voting: in swing states, we’ll urge progressives to vote against Romney/Ryan by voting for Obama/Biden (despite our vital policy critiques) — and we’ll urge progressives in non-swing states to seriously consider voting for unabashed peace and justice candidates.
UPDATE: “Dilbert” creator Scott Adams, upset with federal marijuana arrests in California, says he has no choice but to vote for Romney.
#1 by Larry Bergan on October 17, 2012 - 7:23 pm
Obviously, none of these children are old enough to vote, but I’m pretty sure who their teacher or conductor wants us to vote for. (take that out of context and attach it to my name, and it sounds really bad)
Did Chris – both sides of the aisle – Mathews, want to scare us?
These things take time. That’s why I put an Obama/Biden sticker on my car this morning.
Plus, I thought Rocky did a much better job then Stein on the first Democracy Now debate. (haven’t had time to watch the entire three hours, because I have to work).
Let’s face it; the lesser of two evils is less evil.
Very interesting debate between a black and white guy.
#2 by brewski on October 17, 2012 - 8:03 pm
Stein is a much better candidate than Cynthia “I love genocidal murderers” McKinney.
#3 by Larry Bergan on October 17, 2012 - 8:30 pm
brewski:
We’re really going to need a GOOD link on that one; and I’m not talking about Stein.
#4 by Larry Bergan on October 17, 2012 - 8:41 pm
I’m also not talking about “news” Max.
Please reply.
#5 by brewski on October 17, 2012 - 8:49 pm
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/05/former-rep-cynthia-mckinney-appears-on-libyan-state-tv-video.php
http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/cynthia-mckinney?before=1306354221
#6 by cav on October 17, 2012 - 10:27 pm
brewski. The quotation marks in your ridiculous propaganda are a lie. You do this on purpose, and should be ashamed of yourself.
Again, your credibility plummets faster than the guy that jumped out of the balloon the other day. I’m gonna stop listening to your drivel.
#7 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 17, 2012 - 11:13 pm
It is hardly ridiculous, the drone was identified as a terror weapon in post war WW2 tribunals, one of the reasons Werner had to come to the US, or rot in prison or be put to death because he conceived them.
Obama authorizes the use of NAZI TERROR WEAPONS! There is no way out of it. It’s war crime.. The world knows it, we know it, some of us want to vote for the Cult leader so badly they can ignore the facts or delude themselves that a non murderer candidate is already worse, that is illogical and psychotic thinking.
You only are what are after you have committed the behavior that defines you…..NOT BEFORE!!
#8 by Richard Warnick on October 18, 2012 - 12:08 am
I think it was Lily Tomlin who said, “The problem with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat.”
#9 by Shane on October 18, 2012 - 7:29 am
Cav, join the club. Once you start blocking out the racists homophobic sexist little prick, your whole day becomes better.
Besides, he is just like Mittens. After every partial truth and hate filled screed he posts I can just see him walking away from the virtual podium with that same self satisfied smirk Mitt had after he turned the deaths of good Americans into a campaign speech…
#10 by brewski on October 18, 2012 - 8:49 am
So you agree with what McKinney said?
#11 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 18, 2012 - 10:11 am
But Shane supports the lying murderer who created the policies that have led to our dead service people, 2/3rds of whom have died in Afghanistan in 4 years under obama policy, that and droning people to death.
Shane speaking is a form of drone terror….
#12 by Richard Warnick on October 18, 2012 - 12:34 pm
UPDATE: Strategic voting is how the people can win (now we just need a song!)
#13 by Larry Bergan on October 18, 2012 - 6:54 pm
All I know about Gaddafi is that he was a boogie man in American “news” media for over thirty years – much longer then Hugo Chavez – and even after Reagan bombed his family, things seemed to get cozy for a while.
When brave people like Cynthia McKinney, Cindy Sheehan, Sean Penn and others go to dangerous places and try to do the job the “news” media is supposed to be doing, they get nothing but flack from trolls without names.
An unprecedented number of journalists were made dead during the Bush administration. I’m not so sure which side killed them.
Shame on trolls!
#14 by brewski on October 18, 2012 - 8:07 pm
It’s brave to cozy up with mass murderers?
http://clockworkconservative.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/lockerbie-crash-site.jpg?w=500
#15 by Larry Bergan on October 18, 2012 - 8:35 pm
So noname dredges up the Lockerbie bombing.
brewski: Who really cozied up with Gaddafi?
#16 by brewski on October 18, 2012 - 9:49 pm
http://newsone.com/1253455/cynthia-mckinney-libyan-tv-war-obama/
#17 by brewski on October 18, 2012 - 9:57 pm
“Under the economic policies of the Obama administration, those who have the least are losing the most. And those who have the most are getting even more,”
Cynthia McKinney
#18 by cav on October 18, 2012 - 10:01 pm
So good it had to be posted a second time? Eh? Your assessment was bullshit the first go round and the moldiness isn’t working to enhance its shelf-life tonite.
Got anything real. I guess not.
#19 by Larry Bergan on October 18, 2012 - 11:11 pm
Cynthia McKinney has a name; not a fake name or several names. She has taken on the most powerful people on the earth many times. She got taken out of office by voting machines – as far as I can tell.
She, and other fellow soldiers, didn’t have enough money to be canonized. Their only failing.
#20 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 19, 2012 - 12:07 am
Cindy Sheehan likes my posts on facecrook..we have chatted.
#21 by Larry Bergan on October 19, 2012 - 12:12 am
I’m talking/chatting to a fake name right now.
What fake name were you using to talk to Cindy, noname?
Be honest for once.
#22 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 19, 2012 - 12:21 am
She doesn’t care, why should you?
It’s because you are an un American little nazi.
You pick your brownshirt yet? Always remember the brownshirts get whacked after their usefulness as idiots is at an end.
#23 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 19, 2012 - 12:24 am
She would never dream of violating your privacy like bush and obama do, listening in on your cell calls, reading shitty little blogs like this. Keeping a database on people using their names with their asses wide open.
#24 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 19, 2012 - 12:27 am
Pretty much have you pegged Larry, as a useful idiot, or in on the sham, or both, edging to a bit power censoring this blog of sources and comments you don’t like.
It is a very important job for a progressive socialist nazi Gauleiter. You look that word up yet?
#25 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 19, 2012 - 12:28 am
Pretty much have you pegged Larry, as a useful idiot, or in on the sham, or both, edging to a bit of power in censoring this blog of sources and comments you don’t like.
It is a very important job for a progressive, soshulist, nazi Gauleiter. You look that word up yet?
#26 by Larry Bergan on October 19, 2012 - 12:44 am
Nonames vote for Sara Palin and Joe The Plumber in private.
Heros!
Heros, I say!
#27 by cav on October 19, 2012 - 8:52 am
As Noam Chomsky has repeatedly told us: if you try to start a rational discussion of terrorism you get accused of being an apologist for terrorism, or worse.
It might be helpful to ask about the violence perpetrated against those people / groups / governments that have even so much as questioned what Manifest Destiny as translated by the U. S. of A., means to them.
Bullying and arrogance, will be readily unmasked.
#28 by Richard Warnick on October 19, 2012 - 8:59 am
Willard “Mitt” Romney doesn’t ever want to apologize for terrorism. Of course, he calls it “American Greatness,” not terrorism. This is what he will say during Monday’s foreign policy debate.
#29 by brewski on October 19, 2012 - 9:05 am
Chomsky is a hypocrite:
http://www.hoover.org/publications/hoover-digest/article/6222
#30 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 19, 2012 - 9:53 am
Yeah, well, hell, it is hard to be a social genius without taking license..perceived to be smarter people get to be hypocrites by pointing out your hypocrisy. Whoever accuses first wins..
Play the game by the rules or be marginalized. There is only one rule, make as much as you can off of whatever you got.
Simple, enter redistribution and the producers in society buy a 55 footer and split, while your unimaginative economic drones languish, or until one of the working class gets a iota in their head and turn an idea and make some bank.
Hypocrite? We should celebrate the man for using the ideologically dumb like Larry to fill up his coffers, and have all kinds of progressive morons attend his lecture circuit feteing him for his virtues all the while collecting a check from people who made bank off the faithful too.
The problem with the dumb is that they WANT to believe. Some hard wired antique of the human apparatus, probably there so your dumb ass would just shut your mouth and do what the smartest person in the Cave said, so as to enhance survival.
#31 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 19, 2012 - 10:07 am
Werner von Braun was well celebrated for his greatness in inventing the “drone” terror weapon. He was very popular.
So much so, that America after the war invited him to come and live and build NAZI TERROR WEAPONS for America. In a well mannered and pleasant invitation, all kinds of NAZI scientists came over in Operation Paperclip, and America wouldn’t take no for an answer so beloved were they. Werner the SS Colonel put his nose to the grindstone for America and is credited with building Amerca’s ballistic missile force, and the elements that made the Moon shot successful.
Once we were able to see things like drones in action, our leaders came to love them for their utility and sheer terror impact of the weapon and others like it.
It’s only terror after all, if you don’t like it. This is what hypocrisy is for, and guys like obama and chomsky use the hypocrisy method like a Glad Rag on the stupid. Buff and shine, buff and shine.
Cheers Larry, here’s to hypocrisy!
#32 by cav on October 19, 2012 - 10:50 am
brewski has made another binding pronouncement. We’d better all listen!
#33 by cav on October 19, 2012 - 11:18 am
“I would suggest that instead of comparing Fascism and Soviet Communism, the Left and the entire thinking world would begin comparing what is truly comparable: the Fascism, Western colonialism and market fundamentalism (the most violent fundamentalist faith on earth today), served and represented by “Western multi-party systems” and “Constitutional monarchies”.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/10/19/our-leningrad/
#34 by Gauleiter Burgen on October 19, 2012 - 12:28 pm
Bingo!